1. CAPE LE GRAND NATIONAL PARK - 5 nights
We left Esperance after a quick shopping and water top up and headed East into the very popular Cape Le Grand NP. This one seems to be on the itinerary of every backpacker and visitor to WA. I think people get a bit of a surprise when they realise it's a cheeky 8 hour drive once they pick up their hire car from the airport! It is very beautiful with squeaky white sandy beaches, crystal clear turquoise waters and amazing coastal scenery. Definitely worth visiting. We allowed 5 nights to soak it all up and allow us time to have a good look around.
All campgrounds were fully booked while we were here and the main reason for our somewhat delayed entry into WA - timing our arrival with the end of the school holidays.
Looking back over the campground behind Cape Le Grand beach. We could hear the sound of the surf all day and night and was the beginning of many nights of crashing surf lulling us to sleep.
Quick! To the beach. Our first taste of Cape Le Grand beach just metres down a sandy track from our camp site. You can drive your car on the beach here starting at Cape Le Grand beach and driving for 20kms to rejoin the road back to Esperance.
Sunset fun Cape Le Grand beach
Hellfire Beach beauty. We spent a very lovely day exploring the beaches of this exquisite national park, but this was a favourite.
Sunset on fire.
Cape Le Grand is famous for its beach kangaroos - the kids loved this. 
Wharton Beach - a drive outside the park but well worth it. We stopped in at the Condingup Tavern for some super yummy lunch and an ice cream on the way back. Sometimes the out-of-the-way places really surprise you. It's a family run tavern with a restaurant/cafe, fuel, general store and bar about an hours drive north west of where we were staying. We also saw a huge flock of Baudin's black cockatoos.
Moody morning at Cape Le Grand. We had fabulous warm weather for the first few days, and we knew the forecast was for wind and rain for the last few days. We made plans to enjoy the beach weather and just chill out a bit, and start our school routine.
Walking trail up over granite boulders. These granite outcrops dominate this part of WA - incredibly hard and erosion resistant remnants of ancient volcanic flows.
Waiting for the sun to come up. I. love to be up early and have a cup of coffee in the quiet of predawn (as long as its not too cold). It's also one of the best times to see wildlife.
Our campsite at Cape Le Grand Beach campground. There are just 14 sites at this campground, compared to 55 at Lucky Bay, and you choose an available spot on arrival. All the campgrounds were fully booked while we were staying, they are highly sought after sites and well and truly on the tourist trail with lots of hire vehicles, as well as private, pulling in for a night or two. Five nights is our longest stay to date, with most stays being 2 or 3 nights.
Amazing, and huge, piece of mud cake home-made from Condingup Tavern. It was rich and delicious and eaten by Andy and I with a cup of tea while the kids were playing at the beach (they didn't miss out!) 
These two! Jemma and James love mucking around on the beach. It ticks a lot of sensory boxes for James. Jemma still loves to play shops and cafes and create 'meals' from sand and seaweed and other bits of flotsam and jetsam, to order. She has also improved her handstand times and her cartwheels are fantastic.SCHOOL
We timed our arrival in Esperance with the end of the SA (&WA) school holidays which meant back-to-school routines for us all. We established a pretty good habit go getting up, breakfast and a solid hour or so of maths practice. Initially there was resistance and distractions but once we got going it was fine. We tend to spend 1-1.5 hrs one-on-one with the kids explicitly learning from books - maths and science in particular. It's not 100% perfect, but we are really trying to fit it in.
Travel days can be anything from 3-6 hours on the road - not all just straight driving, often diverting and sightseeing along the way. Lots of hopping in and out of the car. Stopping for wees, snacks, lunch, big flocks of birds, and other POI. The kids have never travelled with screens in the car, and still don't. In the front we use our phones for navigation (and still sometimes get a bit lost) and audiobooks/podcasts. We are currently making our way through Philip Pullman's 'His Dark Materials' series - we are into Book 2 (the Nullarbor chewed up most of Book 1).
James is trying to send weekly 'reports' to his home group although sometimes it's hard to stay up to date at times. {I am writing this from Perth, so I'm running about 5 days late myself}.
We are also visiting some museums and local attractions which we have asked the kids to write reports or make a presentation about. It's really interesting to see the different ways they, and we all, view the same experience!
Socially the kids are exceptional chameleons - if there are kids, they play.
'You're standing in my solar!' Our new solar panels are powering our fridge when we are stopped for a few days, as well as powering up our little power station which in turn charges phones, laptops and lights. So far so good with this system. It takes the pressure off our auxiliary battery especially if we are stopped for a while, and will come into its own when we get to warmer weather. 
Always looking for water - this was a drinking water station at the Denmark Visitors Centre. Makes for a very nice change to be able to get lovely *FREE* drinking water straight out of a tap. This is definitely not something you can ever take for granted. And sometimes there's no water for buying either, which can be a bit stressful.
The *no-seeums* at Cape Le Grand were ferocious. The problem with whatever caused these bites/stings is that you cannot see them, nor feel them biting or stinging you so I didn't take precautions. Both my knees and upper thighs looked like this. I was initially applying SOOV to take the fire out of them but ended up needing antihistamines to take the heat and itch out! The itch lasted over a week. Luckily I am the only one in our family who reacts like this (so far) to insect bites.We headed back into Esperance from Cape Le Grand to do some shopping, top up on water and get some fuel before heading west once more. This time 255km by the direct route - although we seldom seem to be on that one.
2. FITZGERALD RIVER NATION PARK - 2 nights
We accessed this NP from the East near Hopetoun. And it really surprised us.In a good way. The facilities at Four Mile campground for starters - incredible camp kitchen, several free gas BBQs and hot showers.
One of the great things about travelling is meeting and talking to other fellow travellers who have favourite not to be missed spots. We got chatting to some folks at the camp kitchen (where else?) who recommended Munglinup Beach and camping spot. I shared this with Andy and we decided to take a look and if it looked super amazing we would cancel our Fitzgerald RiverNP booking. The advice was first in first served. It would take us off the main road and down some gravel tracks but in theory we would be able to continue along and rejoin the main road without losing any time to get to our actual booking.
Munglinup was ringing some deja vu bells - we had deffos camped somewhere that looked just like it. But it was windy and choppy so we decided to push on. As we were leaving the campground I remarked that the sand dune off to the right looked just like one we climbed to watch a full moon rise all those years ago. Sure enough we had stayed there - the evidence is in our blog (we really should read it again!).
As sometimes happen when the maps say you can continue on and rejoin the road, we couldn't. The road was closed due to heavy rain and it looked like the river crossing had been washed away. So we backtracked the 28km back the highway. Doesn't sound like a lot but 56km of gravel roads adds a considerable chunk of time to a days driving.
We still made reasonable time and it turned out there wasn't a whole lot of choice of sites when we got to Four Mile anyway. We gladly took site 13 and set up.
The amazing Royal Hakeas are found everywhere in Fitzgerald River - pretty impressive foliage. 
Our first mallefowl.
The plant diversity in Fitzgerald River was something else entirely. Everywhere I looked there was a different plant, and some different to anything I know or have seen before. Despite being outside WA's wildflower season there were flowers everywhere.
Our stay in this park coincided with the peak of the Eta Aquarids - an annual meteor shower that appears in the Eastern sky just before dawn. Andy and I witnessed this from a beach camp further up the coast of WA when we were camping with no fly so could see the whole show (in another era).
The plan for Fitzgerald River was to set an alarm for 0345hrs and wake everyone up, rug up and head to the beach overlook for a good view of the sky. I am very proud to say that the kids agreed to this on the promise of shooting stars, and although everyone got up...it didn't quite pay off. Jemma saw 10. James kept looking the wrong way. My neck hurt. Andy was cold. I did see some and the stars were amazing so worth it from that point. AND we will ALWAYS remember that time Mum woke us all up to go look at the stars!
We have seen lots of shooting stars and I'm not sure if I mentioned that we saw our first 'family shooting star' (this is when everyone sees the very same one) in the Gawler Ranges.
We love moonless nights away from towns and light pollution and we are all looking forward to more nights looking at the stars.
Fitzgerald River NP is an absolute beauty and surpassed our expectations. A few of the roads were closed as they had a big dump of rain the week before we got there. We were able to access some of the park and had a good poke about, stopping and walking to lookouts and on beaches.
I love this sign! Black cockies for the next 10km.It was only 17km to the nearest town of Hopetoun from the campground so we pulled in there in the morning so Andy could take a scheduled work call. The kids happily played in a playground and we all indulged in bakery treats for lunch.
We also should have filled up with diesel here as it was cheaper than the bigger town we DID fill up at. You win some, you lose some.
Our pack up was less than ideal with a very wet rain settling on us at our most vulnerable. All our gear was in a state of pack-up and I had unpacked the car in readiness for the repack. Essentially everything we have, including us, and our 600L rooftop storage bag was open to the elements. It was bound to happen, and it happened this day. So wet. Bit grumpy and cross. Not ideal.
3. WEST CAPE HOWE NATIONAL PARK (SHELLEY BEACH) - 4 nights
This spot! This spot was recommended to us back on the other trip and it was a favourite so we decided to revisit it. It also just happened to be halfway between Albany and Denmark which we had earmarked with lots of things-to-do pins. One of the major draws (for us) is that the access road is not suitable for camper trailers, caravans or longer campervans. Pretty much anything bigger than a 4WD vehicle is not meant to use the road. 4WD access only - steep, narrow and windy. So narrow that I was very, very, very, very (you get the picture) pleased not to meet something coming the other way on any of our many entries or exits.Luckily it was super sunny and dry when we got here and most of our wet gear dried very quickly.
Beachfront camping WIN.As a campground its quite small. Three large grassy sites which are perfect for our current set up. Rooftop tenters and small vans are allowed to camp in the carpark. On any given night we were there were at least four or five other campers.
It was the fisher folk that really took up the space. Clearly a beloved local salmon fishing spot, the car park was at times packed and double parked! The salmon were running and we saw some fishers land some whoppers, huge fish.
The beach is beautiful but not safe for swimming as it had a very steep bank with heavy swells creating sandy dumpers. And the fact that some of the salmon being reeled in had chunks/bites out of them....
It wasn't quite warm enough for swimming anyway and the kids were happy walking on the beach and playing with any of the fishers kids.
The view from the drive down to Shelley Beach is spectacular. There were so many seabirds; short-tailed shearwaters, terns, pacific and silver gulls as well as a pair of sea eagles. The scrub behind the campground had lots of little brown bush birds and it was pretty noisy at times.
Sunset at Shelley Beach. There is a small creek coming out onto the beach which James and Jemma spent hours delightfully damming every afternoon. After each damming session they would come 'home' (up the beach and across the carpark) soaked and sandy with no prospect of a warm shower. Let's just say we slept in exfoliating bedding for a few nights.
We did use Shelly Beach as a base to explore some of the amazing places nearby. This is the very insta famous Greens Pool in William Bay NP near Denmark. A stunning ocean pool naturally protected by enormous granite boulders. The kids adored this place and really could have stayed all day.We enjoyed some yummy coffees and iced chocolates (the kid equivalent) in Denmark and got the feeling that it was a lovely little town. Everything is so, so green. The cattle are glossy and fat. The farms are heavily stocked and there are sheep and cows everywhere. Some paddocks also had dozens of roos and emus. A stark contrast to the rock eating sheep of SA.
Greens pool.
Elephant Rocks - just around the corner from Greens Pool. A trip to Albany's Historic Whaling station was on our list. But first a proper shower! Albany has incredible public facilities and we all pulled for a much needed (some more than others) shower. This was our first no limits showers since leaving home approximately 5 weeks before. By no limits I mean - no time limit, not bore water and lots of hot water. Jemma and I luxuriated for as long we thought reasonable. I still help her with the taps as they are so variable, I worry she will scald herself and she worries she won't be able to turn them off.
The whaling station at Albany is a one of a kind 'attraction' (possibly not the word). The Albany whaling station closed down in 1978 quite suddenly, and not a moment too soon for the poor whales. It operated as a whale processing plant for 178 years, killing tens of thousands of sperm and humpback whales (these were the target species, although other species could also fall victim).It was in parts interesting, confronting and at times distressing. The station stands as it did that day in November 1978 when the last whale chaser docked and the crew disembarked for the last time. It has obviously been cleaned up and made safe for the public but you can still walk around and view the flensing deck, the processing vats and the massive head-saw for removing the heads of sperm whales to get at the highly valuable ambergris and spermacetti.
Basically the whole whale was brought to shore, chopped up into pieces that would fit down the holes into the processing vats. After boiling for 3 hours the different layers would settle out - oil, glue water, solids. The oil was used in so may things - lamps, cosmetics, car lubricants. The solids were compressed into pellets and exported for livestock feed. Ambergris was essential in the perfume industry in fixing fragrances. Thankfully chemists have created synthetics to replace the need for the wholesale slaughter of whales, although I think this was response to the end of whaling rather than the driver.
The driver came from activists and the reality that some species were being hunted to near extinction. Humpbacks were protected from 1967 and sperm whales became the sole target of the whalers. Albany is uniquely located close to the continental shelf, and sperm whale hunting grounds.
It's hard to believe this was still going on in my lifetime. And if I had grown up in WA it is likely I would have visited the whaling station in operation as a school excursion! Our friend James remembers visiting as a little boy and he said it was appalling.
The whale blubber was so valuable that when the whalers caught some of the many sharks hanging around the station ( a common hobby apparently) they would cut the sharks open and harvest the blubber from their guts!
There was a skeleton shed - this is Jem with a pygmy blue whale skeleton - the chonky blue whale.
The cat-walk aboard the whale chaser. The cat-walk was a bridge from the wheelhouse to the bow of the ship where the harpoon is located. The skipper of the ship was also the harpoon operator. The harpoons are huge and took two men to load into the gun. They were armed with explosive heads. It's all very macabre.
James up on the cat-walk. James especially loved exploring the ship with all its passages and small rooms. He enjoyed learning about the experiences of the crew on board, working very long hours in often rough, heavy seas. 
Some sobering statistics - 3000 sperm whales in 10 years. This whaling station operated for 178 years! 
Knots. If you don't know knots....tie lots.
Jemma at the helm. We did see three humpback whales in the bay you can see in the background. 
Back at Shelley Beach - back to the dam. 
School work first.
Jemma at school 
And also a laundromat. We pulled in and put some washing on (about 5 loads :)), I left Andy to supervise this with James, while Jemma and I ducked out to do some grocery shopping. All up, it took just over and hour and half to get the washing done. And about $50. Just in the nick of time.
On Mother's Day we left Shelley Beach and headed west once more. We stopped in to do the Valley of the Giants treetop walk near Walpole. There's also a ground based walk amongst the gigantic and very old Tingle trees - up to 70m and 400 years old!
Inside one of the giant trees.
The boardwalk. The highest point of the boardwalk was 40 metres which is plenty high enough. The whole thing was wobbly. And very high. Did I say that? I took my phone out to take some photos and quickly put it away again. I spent the next 15 minutes checking my pockets for keys and phone, keys and phone, when I wasn't holding the railings. It didn't feel unsafe, just high up. I get vertigo pretty badly and this was like one long session of sickening vertigo! It was very beautiful up there in the treetops and it wasn't too busy so that's something.James and I saw one of the male red-winged fairy wrens in the carpark as were leaving. Ticked that one off in the birdy book.
And so we continued west.
4. D'ENTRECASTEAUX NATIONAL PARK - 2 nights
Some campgrounds in WA national parks must be booked prior to arrival, others cannot be booked and it's a first in scenario. The old fashioned payment of cash in the little envelopes that we remember fondly. Our plan was to head for Banksia Camp and hope for the best. We do try and arrive reasonably early in these situations as our tent based set up isn't suitable to super exposed coastal winds, so if we can find somewhere a bit more protected its helpful (and more restful). We also knew that Banksia camp had a hut which could be used if available - it was not! We found out on the road in from another traveller that a school camp had tubs and supplies set up at the hut.
The last 5km into Banksia is a sandy track. We let our tyres down to 20 PSI each and off we went.
I got us bogged a couple of km in. The Patrol just sank down into the sand. We let another 5 PSI out of each tyre, got the 4WD trax things and did some digging and placed them in from of the wheels and presto we were out. We were not the only ones to get bogged by the way, most people we spoke to got stuck for a bit.
The beach down from Banksia - another stunner.
A little squid shell washed up on the beach.
Kangaroo
We were able to use the hut on our second night. There was rain forecast and we watched it close in and then arrive. We moved all of our cooking gear up to the hut and enjoyed some time out of the wind and rain. It meant we were able to play some dice with the kids. Made for a slightly messy pack up with our gear strewn from one end of the campground to the other but it all worked out.The drive back out was fairly uneventful. I did oversteer in soft sand, the wrong way, and came to a standstill. I have been mulling over this ever since - even when I was doing it it felt wrong but my brain kept saying steer left, hard left despite being on fairly straight road. Andy thinks that if I override my brain while driving I should be banned hahahahaha. I am calling this episode ' a little bit bogged' rather than properly bogged, and its all good experience for some of the driving to come. We know we have some serious sandy tracks coning up in a few weeks. Learnings :: deflate the tyres to 15 PSI max, and you can always let more out.
Letting air out of tyres is way faster than putting it back in. We have a small air compressor that is powered by the car battery, and pumps about 6PSI/minute (this is approximate, based on one refill). With our front tyres each needing 15PSI and the back needing 17PSI each we quickly realised that reinflating was going to take a minute or two (these are the kinds of real-world maths questions we are quizzing the kids with). We had factored the sandy track, the possibility of getting bogged and the time it would take to puff our tyres back up, bringing the 5km of sandy track close to one hour of driving and inflating!
And so ended our little stay at Banksia Camp. Our next stop had us heading us north west.
5. LEEUWIN-NATURALISTE NATIONAL PARK - 2 nights
Next stop on our schedule was Point Road campground in Leeuiwin-Naturaliste NP . We popped our destination into our map apps and away we went. It wasn't until we were turning onto smaller and smaller roads that I noticed that our maps indicated that the last 2km was a hike!! *Be prepared to park your car* the maps said to us. And so began some self doubt, double checking of bookings etc. I had booked this months ago and surely I would have registered a walk-in only campsite. Andy was supremely confident that the maps were wrong, and he was right, and that if we just continued down the road (no longer on the map!!) we would find the road into the campground. It turned out that the majority of campers using this camp ground were hikers on the Cape-to-Cape trail (Cape Leeuwin in the south to Cape Naturaliste in the north ~120km) including another [very noisy] school group.
As we drove we also noted that the scenery, while beautiful, did not resemble the images we had seen of the campground showing a tall woodland setting. We were driving through low, coastal shrubs. Just keep going he said. Finally we came across a sign, the first we'd seen, for the campground. It was of the wheel ruts variety, leading off into the scrub. It became more and more wooded until it opened up into the most beautiful, spacious, shady, foresty campground. With fire pits!
And Baudins Balck cockatoos in the trees - busy squawking to one another and dropping tree debris. James was out of the car before it stopped and was lost to us for the first hour or so, happily following the birds activities. While we all set up. Jemma did her first solo tent set up! 
Getting up early isn't easy when you're a big teenager but James always has a smile on his face. He has never been the greatest sleeper and still has nights where he is awake for long periods. The payoff in the the bush is he hears the owls and other night creatures.We really loved this spot and for James Point Road has nudged Brachina East (Flinders Ranges, SA) out of first place.
Fire pit and fire. It was cold in the forest. We could still hear the boom of the surf but it was in the background. We expected everything to be wet with dew the next morning but it was surprisingly dry, just cold. Breathing steam cold. We have been really lucky with the weather so far, with warm sunny days and mostly cool nights for the last few weeks. We really felt the cold this morning.
Injidup beach selfie. We used our Point Road camp as a base to explore the Cape and Margaret River area. Andy knows this are fairly well having spent many happy times here with west coast mates and. He did comment that it was the first time he had ever been to the Margaret River region and not visit a vineyard! We did visit several playgrounds though. A different time.
The beaches here on the Cape are just beautiful. Surf was up at Injidup and there were a few surfers out.
Where two oceans collide - Point Leeuwin
Cape Leeuwin lighthouse - an essential beacon of safety. We were able to go into one of the old lighthouse keeper's houses which was set up as a museum with info about daily life (hard), lighthouses in general and some anecdotes about life on the cape. There were usually 3 lighthouse keepers (and families) posted here at any one time to ensure continuous operation of the lighthouse. My favourite story was when the keeper's cat followed him to work one windy day and up to the lighthouse where he (the cat) was blown off the top and landed in a bush. It survived the 23 floor fall! It was a rare calm day when we visited.
Beginning the 325 step descent into Lake Cave. We did a cave tour in one of the regions many caves.
Looking back up from the entry to the cave.
Opportunity to experience tight spaces - they're in!
Pretty suspended formations in Lake Cave showing the reflections in the lake. My favourite part of this tour was when the guide turned all the lights out (we were prewarned) and we got to experience about 30 seconds of total dark (if you discount the numpties next to us playing with their phones) 
Family at Lake Cave
We visited a few beaches in the Margaret River region. This photo was taken at Prevelly rock pools just near Margaret River surf break. If you look carefully there's an octopus (gloomy?) in the top mid-left and one of its tenticles is testing James's foot just to the right of his big toe. This octopus kept us mesmerised for ages. It was quite curious and very beautiful. Jemma deserves full recognition for finding this 'blue-ringed octopus' in the shallow water. This was a very cool wildlife encounter.Margaret River surf break was humming in the lead up to the Margaret River Classic set to start that weekend. It was crazy busy.
We also visited the huge sting rays of Hamelin Bay and saw some up close and personal.
Posing kookaburra at Yallingup Beach.And that brings that section to a close. We have covered a lot of ground, and seen and done so many things. I have definitely missed lots out.
From the Cape we headed on to Busselton and then towards Perth for some more adventures in the most built up areas we have been in for ages. I will update this as soon as I can. Right now Jemma and I have a date with a shower in a cazza park before the kids and I head to Perth on the train for some sight seeing while Andy works.
Ness xx
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